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4/30/11

Ride Home 4/29

I'm trying to write this post in the amount of time it takes to bake raspberry scones. Excuse me if elide over some details, like the actual biking. Just kidding. It's not like I'm just going to cop out and post a bunch of random pictures.
Two part ride yesterday on account of having to go to a baseball game. I say "having to" because it was my boss's boss's boss's (you can see how low I am on the totem pole), aka the Dean's, retirement party and it was taking place at the baseball game. Whereas my colleagues decided to take their chances with the Metro, I biked down Massachusetts through Dupont Cicle and then to 15th. It might not have been the most direct way to get there, but I really struggled with how to get there. I could have maybe gone down through Georgetown then the Rock Creek Trail at the end of K to Ohio Drive to somehow connect to the not-quite-Anacostia Riverwalk Trail, but I remembered that it was Friday and that's when the Rock Creek Trail would be full of zombie joggers, mindlessly trudging their way through life while taking up more space that necessary. So, I stuck to streets. Massachusetts is a highway. I wouldn't recommend it to newer bicyclists or bicyclists who need newer brakes. Dupont was only a little bit of a cluster. I really wish that there was a bike lane between Dupont and 15th Street, but instead I rode in a combination of parking lane and right travel lane. Not much room to squeeze through in some spots.
Oh, the Kleinway. I've ridden it more more recently than I ever had before and I have to say that I really enjoy it. It just feels so civilized.
From there it was to Pennsylvania Avenue. I rode past the turn because the bollars extend to the pedestrian crosswalk rather than just stop at the bike signal. Whoops. Got passed on Pennsylvania by hipster-girl on fixie and superbiker on superbike. I wasn't dawdling or anything- that's just rush hour, I guess.
I turned off of Penn to 4th, took 4th through Urban Renewal-stan/Great Society-ville. I'm strangely enchanted by the area south of the Mall and north of the freeway. From there, I rode down to P and rode in the oncoming car lane up P to avoid the traffic waiting to turn onto South Capitol. Then it was to the bike valet at the stadium, which I will write more about in a separate post later. Sorry if you've read this far lured by the idea that I'd write about it here.
Leaving the stadium after the revelry, hot dogs and gouge-ily priced beer, I initially planned to maybe take fake-ART to 14th Street and then get on a trail, but I declined. I'm not confident that my front light has enough juice to fully illuminate the trails in Virginia. I don't know what the light situation is like over there, since I've never really had occasion to ride them at night. And by them I mean the Mount Vernon Trail and the W &OD to George Mason Drive. I rode the Mount Vernon Trail once at night from the TR Bridge past TR Island and that was the darkest, most dangerous ride I've ever done. A blinky is not sufficient, even when it's 5 LEDs.
Scone beeper went off, but I'm gonna push through.
So, I went back almost the way I came. Over and up 4th which was a ghost town, past the Mall (very bumpy in front of the National Gallery) and then onto Pennsylvania again. I stopped in front of the White House and took a picture.

If you like taking bad pictures of tourist attractions, it's way better to due when riding a bike than when on the Metro. What they get to see of tourist DC is this:

Bike cop in Georgetown. I don't know where he was going. He didn't look like he was doing anything official.

Back in Arlington, nothing new. Wilson is a pretty good street for night riding. Clarendon was semi-jumping, in the way that Clarendon always is. They still haven't paved near our street, but the bike really just seems to love that and just eats up the rough patches. Thanks, bike.